Oscar in Honduras asked:

How can faith be shared?

My own Christian life began with sharing my faith with unbelievers from the moment I was born again. It was a very important part of the expression of my faith.

Recently I was thinking back about some of things that were happening when I was growing up in the Lord in the 1970s. I came to the Lord in 1975. Most of the people who were coming to the Lord at the same time as me in the same place were young people and we were really sold out to God, we were just really in love with Jesus because of what He'd done for us.

We'd seen the change in our lives since we'd come to Him. We'd known that our lives had been empty that we'd been wandering - we hadn't known, before that, where we were going and we hadn't known where we had come from. When you don't know where you're going and you don't know where you've come from I think your mind must always be in something of a state of confusion. I was so pleased to be liberated to know who I am, why I am here and where I am going.

I was just rejoicing in that time and all of these other young Christians were doing the same. They were just rejoicing in their new lives in Christ and just wanting to live for Jesus. They didn't really want to live for anything else because everything else that they'd tried had let them down and had never filled that emptiness. Their old life had often cost them a lot in health, in well-being and mental condition and now they just wanted to follow Jesus and live for Jesus!

The first outreach I was involved in as a young Christian was in Amsterdam. We had a coffee shop right in the center of the city close to the Central Station. I returned a few Christmas' ago to Amsterdam for the first time in years and years - 15 or 20 years - and I came out of the Central Station and looked across at the building where this coffee shop had been. I was thrilled because right across the top of the building, for everyone coming out of the Central Station to see, in big letters was "Jesus Saves"!

There's no Christian coffee shop there now but what we used to do there was have entertainment and serve coffee in the evening and minister to those who came in. In the day we would just go out on the street giving out invitations for the coffee shop or distributing some kind of Gospel tract.

We used to get right on the Damrak - the main street - and just stop people. For me as a young believer it was thrilling. I remember at the time having a gift by God's Spirit for recognising what nationality people were. So people would be walking up the road and I'd say, "Hi! You're from Israel aren't you?" or whatever country I sensed they were from. They would be amazed and we'd be straight into a conversation that usually led into a witness for Jesus.

It has always been a lot of fun for me as a Christian meeting people and sharing with them, whenever possible, what the Lord had done for me. Those people I met while a young Christian and, so often, those I've met since have easily related to what I've said to them. They've very often been much like me and frequently, as I had been, they were wandering in life seeking direction, purpose or answers.

This is how we can witness or share our faith! We can meet people on our own level and relate to them on the level of their own lives and our own lives. We are always meeting people whom we can relate to and who can relate to us.

You don't really even need to get into a conversation before people relate or connect with you. People connect with your appearance, they'll connect with your age and they connect with your social position. People connect with you in the community in which you live.

From this you can get to talking with them and you'll find you'll be sharing common aspects of your life and theirs. You can let this conversation run on and it will lead into you sharing something of your experience of life. They will connect to this and you can share with them Jesus! They can start to see that they can have Jesus who has filled your emptiness. They can have a relationship with your Saviour too!

The interesting thing is that, as a result, at first they will believe because of your word but then they'll go away and they'll say to God something like, "John/Jenny said that You had done this for him/her. How about doing this for me too?" God will respond and do it for them as He did it for you! Then they'll come to back to you and say, "Well, first of all I believed because of what you said but now I've heard Him and known Him for myself. Now I have a direct connection myself with the Lord."

This is how Christianity is set up to grow - one at a time! It can grow in the thousands but the basic method of multiplication of the church is that of conception happening because the Word of God comes from you into someone's heart. They are then born again by the Word of God.

It's exciting that each one of us can cause that to happen. Each one of us can share with someone and others can come to know the Lord in that way.

Now that pattern, by the way, is in the Bible. What I've just described to you doesn't only happen now it happened when Jesus was ministering on the earth. In John chapter four Jesus met a woman at the well. I think Jesus purposely waited at that well knowing that the woman was coming. He had a word of knowledge on it, He knew by the Spirit that she was coming.

Jesus shared salvation with her. At this she recognised that He was the Messiah and immediately she went away excited to her village to tell everyone there. She said, "Isn't this Man the Christ?" So they all went out to see and before long they were coming back to her saying, "Now we don't just believe because of your word, now we've had His word on it. We know He is the Messiah."

The Samaritan woman's whole village ended up receiving Jesus. Just imagine that happening in your locality! The whole place would be getting excited because they were receiving Jesus. Think about it. You could be one of the ones who got it started just because you took time to share with one person! John 4:39-42